This is my first time positing to this forum so I apologize in advance for the length. Also, I wanted to thank everyone who is already an active member as I have greatly expanded my knowledge of hairloss by looking through the threads before and after my hair transplant procedure.
Just to provide a bit of personal background, I started to lose my hair at the age of 17. As soon as I could, I started taking propecia in combination with rogaine which not only helped retain my remaining hair, but actually significantly increased hair growth in some areas. Granted, when I went off to college, I had to somewhat sport the combover look, but, all in all, my hair loss wasn’t that obvious. This situation continued until my senior year at college when my hairloss accelerated and it was quite obvious (especially in the middle and front) that I was losing my hair. Despite losing some ground in the hair loss battle, I continued to use finasteride and rogaine and eventually things stabilized.
Fast forwarding two years, I finally had saved enough money for a hair transplant. Despite being only 24 years old, I thought I would be a good candidate since my hair loss pattern seemed pretty well established and had not changed that much since my senior year in college. I was also still taking finasteride and rogaine to maintain my remaining hair. I started to do my research and finally decided to meet with a hair transplant surgeon with excellent credentials (actually, someone recommended on this site). After the consultation, I decided to proceed with the hair transplant. I ended up getting 2800 grafts.
After going through the procedure, I patiently waited the year for the transplanted hair to come in fully. During this time, I met with my surgeon nine months after the procedure just to make sure everything was coming in correctly—at the time, he indicated that he was happy with the progress and I could definitely see new hair growth. After the one year mark, I noticed a significant difference and could now grow my hair out to an inch without any obvious balding areas…I was extremely satisfied with the outcome. This was my situation for nearly 4 months until I noticed that my hair started to thin in the areas where I received the transplants. I first told myself that maybe I was being over-sensitive or that a slight shedding was just part of the process, but after 4 months of progressively thinning hair I decided to call up my surgeon and ask him to take a look.
After examining my scalp, he didn’t know why I was losing hair so rapidly from the transplanted areas. Fortunately, the month before seeing him, I went in for a physical to eliminate any medical reason for my thinning hair—everything came back normal. The only thing my surgeon noticed was mild dandruff buildup which he prescribed DHS tar shampoo for, but acknowledged that this was not likely the cause. I have been using the shampoo for the past month without any difference. I forgot to mention that after the surgery, I continued to use finasteride (1.25 mg) and rogaine daily. At this moment, I am basically back to where I was before investing into the procedure and, needless to say, very disappointed with the results. I am going to meet with my surgeon later this month to further discuss my options. That is the reason I am not revealing the name of my surgeon because he will hopefully live up to his word and rectify the situation.
So after that novel (again, apologize for the length) I was curious whether this has ever happened to anyone else before and what did your surgeon do for you? I am just confused why a hair transplant would only work for a year and a half, considering that I continued to use finasteride and rogaine daily. Thanks for your help.